Ok, to be more specific: Nothing in the hands of the Maker is ever wasted!
The first time I heard this, I was knee-deep in one of my darkest seasons. I mean giza giza! Mwaka 2016!
And my friend, bless her heart, said to me in one of our conversations:
"Ice, I pray that this pain is not wasted."
I froze!
Yes, the irony isn’t lost on me.
For the life of me, I couldn’t fathom how that kind of pain would ever be useful.
Ah! Ah! Ah!
Give time, time—it will surprise you!
Anyway—back to the “nothing is ever wasted” bit.
Over the weekend, I was out living my best Auntie duties (a.k.a bike riding), when a memory hit me like how these bills keep coming!
See, back in the day, we lived in a “gated community.”
(Ahem—gated in the sense that they were KNH staff quarters housing.)
Huku ndio trauma ya “haves” and “have-nots” ilianza.
Sasa, there were some cool kids who had bikes.
Not just any bikes—mountain bikes.
(Ahem, if you know, you know.)
Sisi? We weren’t among the cool kids.
Basically, we didn’t have bikes.
The cool kids behaved like they held the keys to the pearly gates!
The grounds they rode on were ‘holy grounds’.
Yaani, it was their world and we were just living in it!
Ah, the begging. The flattery. The psychological warfare just to get one ride.
Utter madness!
And the plot twist?
I didn’t even know how to ride a bike!
So now I had two problems:
Beg for a bike
Get someone to teach me how to ride it
Shida tu!
Now where would I begin?
Ni kubeg, gravel for the bike ama nikufunzwa how to ride?
I needed to choose a struggle.
I chose peace and living in my head.
I’d watch the ‘haves’ for hours as they rode their little hearts out,
the ‘have-nots’ worshipped the grounds the ‘haves’ rode on.
But that feeling of not having?
Myeeeen, it's unforgettable.
AND don’t get me started on swimming!
Woooiii!!!
I never had a swimsuit!
This wasn’t anywhere near the hierarchy of needs that Mother and Rev were trying to meet!
I didn’t even have the language to ask for a swimsuit!
Lakini, peer pressure had me in a chokehold.
An opportunity to go swimming with other kids in the estate presented itself.
In true Ice fashion, I decided to be my own savior.
I stitched up one of my cotton vests down the middle,
since I had seen how swimsuits looked like.
AKI, it was a cotton vest!
Like that’s not bad enough—it was one of those vests where the color would run.
Let that SINK.
Yooooo!!!
The stares, the subtle laughs, the whispers that followed—INSANE!
Then did I know how to swim?
If you answered “No”—you know me too well!!
Weeee!!!
Now I know why learning how to ride a bike and how to swim are two major activities that have stayed on my bucket list!
Inner child must be healed!
Go to therapy.
Imagine, ni muhimu.
